Hello Friend! Welcome to my blog! Here you will find various projects of mine through out the years, as well as recent creations. Hopefully some of my stuff shown here will be a good guide for some of you, and for others perhaps a good inspiration to make your own creations. If you are a regular to this website, please be sure to look at older posts often - as I am constantly updating my projects. Enjoy!

Monday, June 30, 2014

Since I was in the process of moving when I made that table, there were not many photos - especially photos that weren't surrounded by clutter. So I decided to make a new post, showing better pictures of my work table. Now that I live in my own house and have space, I was able to start off making 2 tables.

The table I made in New York was a 6-foot long table. I decided to start off making two 4-foot long tables. I designed the tables in sketchup.

Once I knew how much material I needed, I went to the store and bought it.

All I had to work on was my saw horses, but it worked out well.

I cut the pieces I needed....

...and began assembly. I used the same rigid ties that I had used on my tables in New York.

And very soon I had the frame of my first table.

I added a 2'x4' table top made out of 1/2" plywood.

The bottom shelf needed to be cut slightly in order to fit.

With one table done, I took my tools off of the floor, and placed them on my new table.

Time to begin the second table...

This one was made the same way as the first.

I added a power strip to the side of this table.

And before I knew it, I had 2 work tables!

These tables are great, but I needed a spot to hold some stuff - mostly my clamps. So I screwed a 2x4 to the wall...

...and hung up my clamps and rulers.

I added a second, smaller 2x4 for my smaller clamps.

And my workshop was underway!

One problem I wound up having was the amount of saw dust getting under and behind my tables. They are too heavy to move with all my tools stored on them, and it's annoying to remove everything simply to move the tables to clean around them...

....so I bought some casters (wheels)

And I attached them to the legs. I added an extra 2x4 between the legs for support and I had a wider surface to screw the casters to.

With wheels my tables move around quite nicely.

Once both tables had casters, I promptly cleaned my work space.

And everything is nice and clean!

These work tables are simple to make, and not overly expensive. I hope to soon add some more to my work area. Thanks for reading!

UPDATE: 7 months after making these incredibly useful tables, I decided my garage needed another such table, only bigger.

I had some fold-down tables that were supported by saw horses, but these tables would not be strong enough to support some new machinery I was getting.

I made this table using OSB boards instead of plywood. The reason being was that I didn't plan on doing much work on this table. It's main function is to hold my new surface planer, plus various boards on the bottom shelf. It does it's job very well.

These tables are perhaps the most important tool I have in my workshop! Thanks for reading!

Wednesday, June 25, 2014

At the point of this writing, I have made a lot of new furniture for my new house. However, those pieces that I have made were merely reproductions of my original rustic furniture I made over a year ago. Now it's time to make something new, and I decided that thing shall be a bar!

To begin, I created a bar with one large drawer and 2 swinging doors. This bar will go in my dining room, and shouldn't be too big. My design was simple and I created it in SketchUp.

Now that I know what size everything will be, I went to the hardware store and bought some wood.

Most of the boards for this project will be 3/4" particle board. These pieces cut very nicely on my table saw.

I then began assembling the carcass of the bar using pocket holes and screws.

When the carcass was done, I began constructing the face frame. I used my miter saw to cut the pine boards to size and also assembled them using pocket holes and screws.

I used some glue and my nail gun to attach the face frame to the carcass.

Then I began cleaning up a few areas that weren't completely level. I did this using my block plane and my mouse sander.

Next I used my router to give the table top a nice edge.

Once that was done I began to work on making the drawer.

This was the first sliding drawer I've made and I was super happy that it came out quite well.

With the drawer done, it's time to work on the doors. These were made out of leftover pine boards.

I cut them to size and assembled them using pocket holes and screws.

These board were pretty warped, so I used some other pieces of wood as a cross beam and screwed them together. This straightened them out a lot.

Then I attached the doors to some hinges.

I liked the look of the screwed in cross beams on the doors, so I decided to attach a similar piece of wood to the drawer.

When all that was done the whole thing got more sanding.

...followed by some wood filler.

...followed by more sanding.

Once it was completely sanded, I gave the whole things a good cleaning.

And then some stain.

When the stain dried, I sanded some more to give that rustic look that I love.

Then I cleaned the bar one more time.

And then applied some finishing wax.

When it was dry I brought the bar inside the house.

I screwed on a bottle opener to the side.

And then began stocking up the bar!

This was a great little project to work on and I hope you enjoyed reading!

UPDATE: I eventually made one more addition to this bar:

A bottle cap catcher for the side!

It started out as a simple box which would go on the floor...

...but I didn't like it on the floor, so I added some hanging hardware,